The Flame Unknown
by FirePhoenix342
Summary: Naruto is an angst-y cynical 18 year old boy, brought up thinking that he was human. Problems begin to arise when he realizes that he is not, while in school. Possible romance in the future could change rating, depends on what i wanna do, and REVIEWS! (I needed to change his age to fit my plan. oopsies)
1. Prologue

First Naruto fanfic, Naruto is an angst-y cynical 16 year old boy, brought up thinking that he was human. Problems begin to arise when he realizes that he is not, while in school. Possible romance in the future could change rating, depends on what i want to do.

Read and Review, Please I go through stories without them and I cry myself to sleep! (not really but u get the picture, IMPORTANT!)

**Disclaimer**: I do not own any one or any reference to Naruto. At all, i only own his new personality and a later O

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><p>Prologue<p>

The sounds of gasping and moaning in pain could be heard from through the halls of an unused apartment building.

"Kushina, breath. Honey I need you to breath." Minato attempted to calm his labored wife. Kushina's yokai pressure was building as each contraction neared the one previous. She had been in labor with her first child for 2 hours already, and yet had not dilated enough for birth. As a Yoko, a theory about strength was developed about how long the birthing period lasted. If it took a long time to birth a child, the stronger a yoko he or she would be. Minato hated to see his beloved this way. The only other time he had stood beside her unable to help as she was in pain, was when her father had nearly killed her because she had chosen to be with him, and not the suitor her parents chose for her. Kushina's labored breath became ragged as another contraction shook through her body. The contractions were now about fifteen minutes apart, which meant that Kushina was in for a long birth. Minato held his wife's hand as she grasped for something to squeeze to disperse the pain. His mind raced through all of the many possibilities to name the small child. Would it be a boy? Or a girl? What would Kushina want to name their first born? A Traditional yoko name? Or something new? The pain that he was feeling was nothing compared to what he had felt before. Both yoko were from rivaling families, and when they had announced their love, they were disowned. The young lovers were strong for their clans, and there was no doubt that their child would be a force to be reckoned with.

"Minato, water." Kushina's voice was strained and tired. Minato leapt to his feet and he practically flew to the cabinet for a cup of water. Kushina grabbed for the liquid, and practically drained it in one gulp. Her face drenched with sweat and tears, the pain unbearable. Her beloveds concerned face was a distraction, if only temporarily. His blond hair standing up in spikes as was its normal fashion, while parts hung down from underneath his headband. She wondered who their child would look like, Minato or her. Would it have blond hair like his? Or would it have dull orange red hair like hers?

Both new parents had their concerns about their unborn child, but neither would be there to watch their small child grow into a young yoko. After 12 hours of labor, the baby boy was born with golden yellow baby stubble hair. A crash burst through the apartment door.

"Where's the little guy? Or girl?" Jiraiya called. Minato smiled and led the older man into Kushina's room, where she held the small child.

"Jiraiya, thank you for being here." Kushina smiled. That was the last smile Jiraiya would ever see from her. A blast came through the room next to theirs. Minato leapt to his feet, ready to defend his wife and newborn son.

"Quickly give him a name!" Kushina called in a frantic voice.

"Naruto! Name him Naruto!" Minato called back just as frantic. In front of the tall blonde, was his brother.

"Hello again Minato. I see you've been busy. Such a heartwarming moment. Saying goodbye before you both die." Minato could feel the sweat drip down the back of his neck. He had to keep his brother from reaching Kushina and Naruto.

"Kushina run!" He cried, not taking his eyes from the clearly pissed yoko. Kushina stood on unsteady legs and carried Naruto into the backroom of the apartment. Jiraiya followed helping the new mother.

"Jiraiya, take Naruto and run. Please. If you do not hear word from me in two days, I am likely dead. Please, treat him as your own. Raise him, train him. Teach him. Please I beg of you!" She cried to him, giving her first child away. Jiraiya nodded solemnly, he understood what her request meant. The large man, silently opened the window to the room, and disappeared from Kushina's sight.


	2. Shimetsuke

**So here we are with the second chapter! I am really behind with all of my fictions, I don't forget I just lose track, or work on one or another or something like that. SO yeah haha rant over onward march!**

**So yes Naruto is in all reality opposite of what he is in the manga and anime, and this is something completely outside of both so there is no real "world" association. And I have no idea how long the chapters will be, i try to make them all a similar length at least, but there may be a few short ones if I cant think of anything or need a filler. ALSO, for those who don't like NaruHina pairs, or the fact that Naruto isn't really friends with Sasuke or Sakura and that he is friends with Kiba and Shikamaru, then don't read. I don't want to hear criticism for a fanfiction that isn't supposed to follow anything anyway. If you have something constructive, great! If you want to tell me you like it, awesome! But don't tell me it's shitty, or something like that, because if you don't like it then don't read it.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any character from Naruto. I own his new personality though.**

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><p>Naruto had that dream again. The one where he thought he saw his parents, but wasn't sure if it was them or not. They were fighting this fox demon. Whatever, they didn't care for him anyway. For as long as he could remember, it had always been Jiraiya and him. Of course he'd been told to call Jiraiya Uncle, but there was nothing family like about him. He was an older man with gray hair (he claimed it was silver) and his only job was an erotic porn writer. Not that most people knew that. Naruto stood up from his bed and looked in the mirror on the dresser in his room. His blond hair stood on end as was its normal. The scars on his face from a fight long ago hadn't faded. Three lines across each cheek that look like whiskers. He'd won the fight, thanks to Jiraiya's training. Since he was little, Jiraiya had been training him in all the martial arts one could possibly think of. Judo, karate, muay thai, anything and everything. On Narutos stomach was an 8 Trigram seal. A tattoo he'd gotten with Jiraiyas permission. It was a pattern of swirls and points that progressed around his belly button until the bottom of his ribs. It had what looked like Japanese writing on it but he wasn't sure. Sighing, Naruto ran his fingers through his hair and tried to get some of the knots out of it at least. Walking to his closet, he opened the door and pulled out a white button up collared shirt, and a pair of khaki's. It was his schools regulation to wear these clothing.<p>

"Naruto, you almost ready?" Jiraiya called from the other room. Naruto sighed audibly and called back,

"Yeah, keep your pants on." There was a soft chuckle from the other room but no other response. Shuffling his feet, Naruto made it into the kitchen and sat down at the table. Jiraiya wasn't ever known for his cooking ability. Give or take a few things, the best thing he could cook was burnt toast. Not that it mattered, Naruto could stomach the toast until he could buy his breakfast at the school. Pushing the chair back, he stood up and grabbed an apple on his way to the door, in his other hand he grabbed his bag.

"I'm leaving." Jiraiya came bustling into the room.

"So soon?" he asked. Naruto rolled his eyes and nodded his head.

"Student council president remember?" He continued to put his shoes on, then walked out to the balcony closing the door after him. The day was sunny and skies were clear. As he made is way down the steps he heard his name called from the door.

"You forgot your lunch!" Jiraiya called. Naruto sighed and looked up in time to see a brown paper sack come flying over the railing and way over his head. Over the years Jiraiya's depth perception hasn't been the greatest. With a strong jump and a glance under him, Naruto launched himself up to reach the bag before it could get too far away. Tucking his belongings close, Naruto rolled just before hitting the ground to avoid injury.

"You could have made a better throw!" He yelled. Jiraiya shrugged and went on with his business.

"That was an amazing catch." a sarcastic voice came from behind him. He turned around to find a black haired boy with a smirk on his face walking down the street.

"Better than one you would have made. Sasuke. Don't you have somewhere to be? Like sucking the face off of some girl?" Naruto snapped back. A flash of anger went by the other boy's face but he refrained from answering. Naruto had the boy beat. Sasuke was the school's dark horse. He was well loved by all the girls, he was athletic, and he was mysterious. That's all they wanted in a guy. Naruto was the opposite, in certain ways at least. He was just as mysterious if not more, but he was more social, and he was more athletic, and the girls may have liked him, but he did not like the girls. They were loud, and obnoxious, and didn't know the difference between a seductive glance, or a frustrated glare. There was only one girl that he liked. And she didn't seem to even acknowledge his existence. Her name was Hyuuga Hinata. She was a quiet girl, with long black almost midnight blue hair that hung down to her waist. She usually had it braided down her back, but on a rare occasion she left it down. Her eyes were violet with no pupal, and she always had a far away look on her face.

"Hey! Dude wait up!" Naruto turned to see Kiba running up behind him.

"Hey man whats up?" The brown haired boy asked. Kiba was the secretary for the student council, not wanting to be away from his friends.

"Not much, ran past that Sasuke kid on the way here. What's up with the fork up his ass?" Kiba asked Naruto. With a shrug he kept walking, wanting to make it to school on time.

"Have you seen Shikamaru? He was supposed to meet us by now. Although knowing his lazy ass he didn't get up yet." Kiba muttered. Naruto smirked and looked at Kiba's hood.

"Come on man, you've got to leave your dog home. School doesn't allow it remember?" Naruto sighed.

"I know but he wanted to come with me! Kept biting my leg until I picked him up. Annoying pup." Kiba smiled at the puppy in his hood. Kiba's family ran an animal shelter, and Kiba had decided to keep one of the puppies from a recent litter. He'd named it Akamaru.

"Just remember, if you get caught with him, I didn't know you had him." Naruto smirked.

"Whoa! Guys wait." A deeper voice called from behind them. Naruto turned to see Shikamaru running after them. His clothes ruffled, and his hair thrown back into a loose ponytail.

"Did you just wake up?" Kiba asked laughing. Shikamaru glared lazily at him.

"My alarm didn't go off." He muttered. All three boys laughed as they walked into the school. They changed their shoes at the lockers, then went to their home room. People were talking around the classroom, a typical morning for Naruto. He walked to the front of the room, and on the board wrote the lesson plans for the day. They had world history first, then algebra/trigonometry, followed by music, lunch, then P.E. and finished with English. Naruto turned to the class to see them all looking at the board. Today was going to be a good day if he didn't have to go over it with everyone. Sakura Haruno, one of the smartest girls in the school fist pumped at seeing world history. It was her best class. Shikamaru put his head on his desk, and muttered about the troublesome classes for the day. Hinata walked into the class, and without a second glance to the board sat down. Naruto noted that she looked nicer than normal today.

"Alright, thank you Naruto, you may sit now." The teacher walked in. Iruka-sensei was one of the nicest teachers in the school. He was not too tolerant of trouble makers, but he was a great teacher.

"Who remembers the topic from Friday?" he asked looking for his lesson book.

"Sensei, its in your desk." Naruto raised his hand.

"Thank you again Naruto." Iruka regarded him with a smile. The rest of the class went as normal, Naruto and Sakura answering all the questions, and then a quiz at the end.

"You will get your quiz results tomorrow, please be careful on your way to class." He said, dismissing them. Hinata walked out quickly, her lavender eyes shooting one glance at Naruto before she slipped silently from the room. Naruto sighed. School was something that Naruto could throw himself into. His training was done, and he still trained on his own, trying to get stronger. He hated feeling like he had to depend on another person, even though he depended on Jiraiya for some form of food, and shelter. He wanted to be able to take care of himself, without help. And possibly defend someone else that he cared about, should the need arise. But he wasn't able to dedicate all of the time that he wanted. He had school, and then he had to help Kiba, because Naruto worked part time at the clinic cleaning the cages, and taking care of the animals. Although, while there something strange happened once. One of the pet owners, a very distraught woman, came in claiming that her cat was ill. And upon taking the caged pet into one of the examination rooms, Naruto realized that the cat, was in fact a fox.

"That's really stupid of her, calling you a cat. She probably fed you the wrong food too." He smiled to the fox. This fox looked different than most he'd seen go through the vets. It had bright blue eyes, and tip of its ears and tail were almost a red color, rather than black, or white as normal. It's fur was a sleek and bright orange. Its eyes held intelligence, and almost looked annoyed at having to have been there.

"I will let her know that she has been feeding you the wrong food. Just wait there for the doctor." Naruto said, feeling completely inclined to talk to the frustrated vulpine. He turned to open the door and had his hand on the knob when something made him stop.

"Thanks." A growling voice said from the cage. Naruto whirled around, attempting to figure out the voice he had heard. The fox had laid itself down and wasn't facing him. He shook his head and went back to the woman. She was offended that he'd claimed she'd had the wrong species of animal, and that her cat, wasn't a cat at all. After the vet talked to her though, she apologized and took the even more frustrated fox home. Since Naruto couldn't shake the feeling that the fox had said thank you. But he knew for sure that animals couldn't talk. He'd talked to cats, dogs, birds, fish, all types of pets. And never once had he heard them speak, accept in their own language of sorts.

"Dude, he spaced out again. He's getting to be just as bad as you Shikamaru!" Kiba's voice broke through Naruto's thoughts.

"No one can beat this lazy ass." he responded with a smirk, gesturing with his thumb to the vice president. Shikamaru slapped his hand away with a glare. Once math, music, and lunch had passed very uneventfully, the three boys made their way's to the locker room.

"What are we doing in P.E. today?" Kiba asked, no one in particular.

"I think judo, that's what we had been doing before the weekend." Naruto responded. He wasn't paying that much attention to the conversations around him. Something felt off about the school. He had no idea what it was however.

"Naruto!" Shikamaru called urgently. With a glance, Naruto could tell that there was something wrong. Shikamaru never shouted, and the fact that he had told him that he needed to hurry. Naruto changed as fast as he could and followed the rest of the class's boys out to the hallway. Outside, he found the fox that he'd taken care of at the vets office.

"What's a cat doing here?" Someone asked. Naruto scoffed.

"You idiot, that's a fox. Have you ever seen a cat that large?" And in fact, Naruto had never seen a fox that large either. It was the size of a large dog, and it was bigger than the last time he'd seen it.

"I know this fox. I will take care of it. Move along." He instructed, using his authority. Once everyone had gone to the gymnasium, Naruto turned his attention to the animal.

"What are you doing here?" He asked quietly, mostly to himself.

"Finding you, sir." The fox replied politely. Naruto fell back onto his ass at this response.

"You...you can talk?!" He blurted, unsure of what to say.

"Yes. I can only talk with you. Anyone else would hear only yips or barks." The creature explained. Naruto couldn't help his mind wandering to the thought of how words are being formed when the fox didn't really have lips to create them.

"Why only me?" He asked, brushing his silly thought aside. The fox walked up closer to Naruto, who was sitting cross-legged with his hands on his feet. The large animal pressed its black nose to his belly button.

"That is a seal. One that I am being forced to remove. Please forgive me. This will hurt. My name is Kyuubi, by the way." Naruto watched as Kyuubi prodded his stomach. Suddenly everything went black. Immense pain erupted from his core. A memory flooded his mind. Jiraiya, younger looking, carrying a small bundle to a window, giving the baby inside one last look at his mother and father, two strong yoko, fighting off a third. Both with 4 tails twirling behind them. Just as soon as the pain had come it was gone. With a groan Naruto opened his eyes. The world suddenly seemed clearer. The leaves on the trees each had their own definition. The sounds he heard were incredible. The tone of a birds call seemed more on pitch than before, and they seemed to make a song. His ears were flooded with new voices as well. The animals seemed to be holding conversations.

"What did you do?" Naruto asked. His voice sounding almost foreign to him. It once was gravely and tenor, but now it was smooth, and baritone.

"I released the seal on you. I was supposed to do that when you turned 16 but I had no way of finding you, because Jiraiya's seal on you was too tight and I couldn't feel your pressure." the fox licked its paws as though nothing happened.

"What was it that was sealed?" Kyuubi looked at him.

"You. Or the real you, I should say." Upon getting a look from Naruto, Kyuubi continued.

"You are a yoko. A fox demon. And a powerful one at that. Your parents died protecting you, and Jiraiya risked his life to raise you. He put every last bit of pressure he had left in him, into that seal I just released. You really weren't told of your true nature?" Naruto shook his head. He really hadn't been told anything at all. He hadn't known his parents, he hadn't known about who he was, or why he felt different.

"Can you at least tell me if you were trained?" He nodded.

"Good. Less for me to take care of. Now you may want to put your tails away, or at least 8 of them. And your ears." The fox sighed. Naruto hadn't even noticed the 9 tails that were wagging behind him. He had to push past his shock, and fast, because Kiba and Shikamaru had come looking for him.

"Normal human's can't see them. But other demons can. So you will be questioned a lot." Kyuubi laughed.

"Hey, what took so long? The period is almost over!" Shikamaru asked. Kiba just stared at him.

"Dude. We need to talk. Now." He said grabbing Naruto's arm. Shikamaru just mumbled to himself about troublesome animals and walked back into the school. Kyuubi glared at the lazy genius' back and followed Naruto.

"After we've been friends for all these years. You don't think to tell me about something like this?! Huh?!" Kiba demanded.

"Whoa! What are you yelling at me for?! I didn't know anything until this damn fox came along!" Naruto growled back.

"This 'damn fox' has a name. And he couldn't tell you because he himself didn't know." Kyuubi muttered from behind Kiba. The brown haired boy looked embarrassed.

"Oh...well there is no reason for me to hide from you anymore." He said with a smile, releasing his tail. Naruto watched as his friend became a wolf demon.

"We are very closely related, but we wolves don't measure our power by our tails. We measure it by our fur color." He explained.

"As we get older we grow stronger, and mine at this point is the same color as my sister's, who is 5 years older than me." Kiba smiled.

"How many tails do you have?" He asked. Naruto released his tails, and his ears.

"Whoa! Holy Shit! You have 9 tails?!" Naruto shrugged.

"I guess I do. I don't know what that means though." Kiba shook his head.

"It means you are one of the most powerful yoko's alive!" Kyuubi nodded his head.

"You have completed your physical combat training, now, you have to go through your pressure training. Jiraiya told me to give you this." Kyuubi nudged a book toward Naruto. School had faded into the background, and he knew that if Jiraiya had asked someone to do this, he'd taken care of Naruto's absence.

"It explains everything to you, but you are only to read a certain amount at a time, so that you can master everything." Kyuubi explained. Naruto nodded his head, unsure of how to process this information. Kiba and Kyuubi smirked at each other.

"Welcome to the World of the Shimetsuke."

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><p><strong>Whooooo! That took forever! I just needed to sit down and pound it out. I hope that was a good chapter. I don't feel very confident in it, but I'm sure it wasn't that bad. If i misspelled or misused a japanese word, let me know, I dont speak japanese so I wouldn't really know. I hope you liked how I used Kyuubi in the story, because Naruto is the demon with 9 tails (we will see if that is the final number) I needed to find a way for kyuubi to come up. And what better way than a fox familiar for Naruto! As i wrote this I started to get ideas for a one shot...but maybe not...hmmm we will see if one transpires. ANYWAY! <strong>

**Naruto: throwing me for another loop...**

**Fire: well my dear, at this point it is nothing new**

**Naruto: *Growls angrily* **

**Fire: Down boy. **

**Alrighty please review, I would be very thankful *bows deeply* **


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